The present invention relates to a semiconductor device having a plurality of active region groups and contact areas formed for each of the plurality of active region groups and a method for manufacturing the same. Further, the present invention relates to a semiconductor device which has first and second regions having a plurality of MOS transistors formed and arranged therein and in which distances between gate electrodes and impurity concentrations of diffusion layers are different in the first and second regions and a method for manufacturing the same.
The integration density and the capacity of a semiconductor memory device are steadily increased. Particularly, the integration density of a DRAM having memory cells each constructed by one MOS transistor and one capacitor is most rapidly increased because of the memory cell form thereof.
With an increase in the integration density, the area of a memory cell continues to be reduced. As a result, in the DRAM, the area of the charge storage electrode is reduced and the amount of storage charges is reduced, thereby making it difficult to correctly read out a memory signal. Further, it becomes difficult to control the MOS transistor region and element isolation region.
In order to solve the above problem, a DRAM using memory cells (stack type memory cells) each having a structure in which storage charge electrodes are formed on bit lines is proposed. FIG. 1 is a plan view showing the above type of conventional DRAM, and FIGS. 2A to 2C are cross sectional views of the DRAM. FIG. 2A is a cross sectional view taken along a line extending across the active regions and in parallel to the bit line, FIG. 2B is a cross sectional view taken along a line extending across bit line plug electrodes and in parallel to the word line WL, and FIG. 2C is a cross sectional view taken along a line extending across storage charge plug electrodes and in parallel to the word line WL.
In the drawings, 171 denotes a silicon substrate, 171a an active region, 172 an element isolation insulating film, 173 a gate insulating film, 174 a gate electrode, 175 a gate upper/side-wall insulating film, 1761 a bit line plug electrode, 1762 a storage charge plug electrode, 177 an inter-level insulating film, 178 a bit line upper/side-wall insulating film, 179 a storage charge electrode, 180 a capacitor insulating film, and 181 a plate electrode. In the drawing, source and drain electrodes are omitted.
In the above DRAM, the bit line plug electrode 1761 of a pattern as shown in FIG. 3 and the active regions 171a of a pattern as shown in FIG. 4 are used. In FIG. 5, a pattern obtained by superposing them is shown.
In order to form the active regions 171a shown in FIG. 4 by use of a resist pattern, it is necessary to transfer an exposure mask pattern having projecting portions on the resist. However, since it is difficult to accurately transfer the above pattern on the resist, it is impossible to form the memory cells as designed and it is difficult to attain the high integration density.
FIG. 6 is a plan view of a DRAM using other conventional stack type memory cells and FIGS. 7A to 7C are cross sectional views of the DRAM. FIGS. 8 to 10 are views corresponding to FIGS. 3 to 5.
In this type of DRAM, since the active region 171a is rectangular as shown in FIG. 9, a resist pattern can be formed by use of an exposure mask pattern having no projecting portion. However, since the bit line plug electrode 1761 has a projecting portion as shown in FIG. 8, the resist pattern is formed by use of an exposure mask pattern having projecting portions. Therefore, like the former DRAM, it is impossible to form the memory cells as designed and it is difficult to attain the high integration density.
In order to meet the requirement of high integration density and high-speed operation, it is proposed to form the DRAM and a logic device on the same chip. However, if the integration density is further enhanced, it becomes difficult to simultaneously form the DRAM and logic device.
It becomes particularly difficult to simultaneously form MOS transistors of the DRAM and MOS transistors of the logic device. This is because gate side-wall insulating films having different film thicknesses are present. That is, in the MOS transistors in the peripheral area of the DRAM and those of the logic device, the gate side-wall insulating films are made thick in order to enhance the performance thereof, and in the MOS transistors in the memory area of the DRAM, the gate side-wall insulating films are made thin since the wiring pitch (distance between gate electrodes) of the gate wirings (gate electrodes) is small.
In order to solve the above problem, the following process is proposed.
First, as shown in FIG. 11A, insulating films 202 are filled in trenches formed in the surface portion of a p-type silicon substrate 201 by a known method to attain element isolation, and then, gate oxide films 203, gate electrodes 204 and gate cap insulating films 205 are formed in a memory cell area and an area (which is hereinafter referred to as a peripheral area) in which the distance between the gate electrodes is longer than that in the memory cell area.
Next, as shown in FIG. 11B, n-type impurity ion is implanted into the substrate surface with the gate cap insulating films 205 used as a mask so as to form n-type source/drain diffusion layers 206 and then first gate side-wall insulating films 207 with a thickness for the MOS transistors in the memory cell area are formed.
Next, as shown in FIG. 11C, second gate side-wall insulating films 208 are formed to form gate side-wall insulating films with a thickness for the MOS transistors in the peripheral area. That is, the gate side-wall insulating films with a thickness for the MOS transistors in the peripheral area are completed by formation of the first and second gate side-wall insulating films 207, 208. In this case, as a material for the second gate side-wall insulating film 208, a material which does not cause the first gate side-wall insulating film 207 to be made thin at the time of etching of the second gate side-wall insulating film 208 is selected.
Next, as shown in FIG. 1C, n-type source/drain diffusion layers 210 of high impurity concentration are selectively formed in the peripheral area by ion-implantation with the memory cell area covered with a resist pattern 209. After this, the resist pattern 209 is removed.
Then, as shown in FIG. 12A, an inter-level insulating film 211 is formed. For example, a CMP process is effected for planarization for the inter-level insulating film 211.
Next, as shown in FIG. 12B, a resist pattern 212 is formed and the inter-level insulating film 211 on the n-type source/drain regions 206 is selectively etched out with the resist pattern 212 used as a mask, and then, as shown in FIG. 12A, the second gate side-wall insulating films 208 on the n-type source/drain regions 206 is selectively etched out. Thus, the gate side-wall insulating films having different film thicknesses in the memory cell area and in the peripheral area are completed. After this, the resist pattern 212 is removed.
Next, as shown in FIG. 12C, source/drain electrodes 213 are formed in the memory cell area. A concrete method for forming the source/drain electrodes 213 is described below.
First, a conductive film for formation of the source/drain electrodes 213 is formed on the entire surface by a film forming method such as a CVD method. Then, the conductive film is heated to make the surface condition thereof uniform. Finally, the entire surface of the conductive film is etched back or set back to the cap insulating film 205 by a method such as an etching or CMP process. The process effected after the step of forming the source/drain electrodes 213 is the same as the process which is well known in the art.
This type of method has the following problem.
In this method, the n-type source/drain diffusion layers 210 of high impurity concentration are already formed in the peripheral area in the step of forming the inter-level insulating film 211 shown in FIG. 12A.
Therefore, impurity in the n-type source/drain diffusion layers 210 is diffused again (re-diffused) by heat generated at the time of formation of the inter-level insulating film 211, thereby degrading the performance of the MOS transistors in the peripheral area. As a result, for example, there occurs a problem that the operation speed (performance) of the logic device cannot be enhanced. Further, this method has a problem that the process becomes complex in comparison with that of a method for forming gate side-wall insulating films of the same thickness in the memory cell area and in the peripheral area.
The above problems can be summarized as follows.
That is, in the DRAM using the conventional stack type memory cells, it is necessary to use a pattern having a projecting portion which is difficult to be transferred as an exposure mask pattern for forming a resist pattern for formation of bit line plug electrodes or active regions because of the structure thereof and thus it has a problem that the high integration density cannot be easily attained.
Further, in order to attain the high integration density and high performance, a method for forming MOS transistors of the memory cell area and the peripheral area on the same chip is proposed. In this case, the distances between the gate electrodes and the impurity concentrations of the source/drain regions are different in the memory cell area and in the peripheral area, and if an attempt is made to form a semiconductor device with such a structure, impurity in the n-type source/drain regions of high impurity concentration in the peripheral area is re-diffused, thereby degrading the performance of the MOS transistors in the peripheral area and making it impossible to enhance the performance of the device.